


The Killer Potato

by TheAndorianMiningConsortium



Category: Red Dwarf
Genre: Belching, Gen, Gross, Swearing, Toilet humour, castration mention, faeces, garbage, rubbish - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-02
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-28 21:39:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 6,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7657678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAndorianMiningConsortium/pseuds/TheAndorianMiningConsortium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story takes place immediately after the end of the episode 'Waiting for God' in Series 1. In case you can't remember the episode offhand, it shows how a garbage pod shows up at Red Dwarf and Lister looks inside. This does contain spoilers for that episode, but I believe they are all minor ones.</p><p>There is a lot of toilet humour and descriptions of waste, mouldy food, etc. Human waste also plays an integral part in this story. So be warned. Don't read if you're squeamish! If you have a childish sense of humour like me, then this could be the right sort of story for you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Lister put the chicken down and looked again at the contents of the garbage pod. The revolting smells assaulted his nostrils, making him want to gag. He pinched his nose and soldiered on. It was worth it, just to watch Rimmer's face. He wasn't about to let a few smells ruin his fun. Besides, he'd smelt worse down the gents' outside the disco bar in the early hours of the Saturday mornings, back when the crew was alive.

Scrabbling amongst the mess, searching for some appropriately stupid item to tease Rimmer with, he uncovered several empty styrofoam cups, still dripping with congealed coffee residue. He shoved them aside, rummaged through the half-crushed, greasy chip packets, stinking half-eaten fillets of battered cod, slimy chicken nuggets, crunched up sticky beer cans, umpteen cigarette stubs and... what was that box-shaped container, glinting mysteriously amongst the discarded nappies, the rotten sushi and melted ice cream and mouldy salad slush? An entire box set of Downtown Abbey, in mint condition, still sealed in its plastic wrapper!

Lister paused. He could deal with digging through sludge and muck. He took the disgusting and the vomit-inducing in his stride. He could choke back his bile without a second thought - all in pursuit of the greater good - but even _he_ had limits. He shoved the box away, not wanting to look at it if he didn't have to.

Then his hand brushed against something long, thin and stringy, and when he drew it back in surprise, he found a viny plantlike thing wrapped around his finger.

He tried to pull it off, but the vine snapped back like a magnet and wrapping itself around his wrist. “What the sm–?” Again Lister attempted to disentangle himself, but the more he tried to untangle himself from the thing, the harder it clung to him. Its viney tendrils reached out, climbing and spiralling around and around, and within seconds his whole arm it had wrapped up his whole arm and half of his shoulder.

“Lister!” came Rimmer's impatient voice from the other side of the glass. He looked up. Rimmer glared back at him, eyes narrow and nostrils wide. “What are you doing?!” Rimmer scolded him.

“It's not me!” Lister protested. “It's this plant, man, it's trying to eat me!” He grabbed the plant with one hand and gave it a tug. If he could pull the plant one way and pull his body the other, maybe the brute force would rip the vines off... but, no, they just wrapped themselves even more tightly around his arm.

He tried his foot. Gripping the edge of the pod for support, Lister lifted one foot, stamped down on a section of vine and pressed it down. He then violently yanked his other arm back, hoping to snap the plant in two.

No luck. The vine reached out with its spiralling tendrils and wove itself around his ankle. Lister jumped back, and the vine climbed up his leg.

“Augh!!” He tried to run, but the plant stopped him, twisting itself around the sole of his foot and yanking him. He fell flat on his face. Dazed and bruised, he cracked open his eyes, and looked up. Rimmer stared down at him from beyond the glass. From this view, Lister could see right up his cavernous nostrils.

“Aliens!” Rimmer proclaimed.

Aliens. Lister would have shrugged and rolled his eyes. It was hard to do that whilst pinned to the floor by a ravenous plant. “Rimmer!” he yelled. “Help me!” He tried to reach out, but the plant pinned his arm to his side, immobilising him.

“Well, now,” said Rimmer, adopting that infuriatingly self-satisfied tone he reserved for situations when someone else was in trouble and he had no in intention of lifting a finger help them. “If you want my opinion, you deserve everything you get. Perhaps you'll think next time before sticking your fingers into places where no finger had been stuck before.”

By now the vine had woven itself about Lister's chest. It pressed down against his ribcage, and it was getting hard to suck in air. “I can't breathe!” he choked. “Rimmer! Get me out of here!”

Rimmer pursed his lips, one hand cupped to his chin in thought, and didn't say anything. A smile began to spread across his smug face.

“Rimmer!” Lister cried desperately as the vine began spiralling up his other leg too. “This plant's trying to make me into its pre-lunch snack! I can hardly breathe, man! Rimmer! _Do_ something!!”

Ignoring Lister, Rimmer turned to look up at the computer screen on the wall. “Holly, what is it?” he asked.

“Don't know, Arn,” came the computer's dull voice over the ship's speakers.

“You don't know?”

“Well,” Holly said non-committally, “not without running a deeper analysis on it, anyway.”

“And does it present a danger to the crew?” Rimmer asked. His voice contained the same sort of glee one might use when asking if the sausages came a free helping of chips. Lister could have punched him.

“RIMMER!” Lister hollerred at the top of his voice. It took every ounce of effort he could muster just to get a single breath out. “This thing is strangling me! Help!”

“Yes,” said Holly, answering Rimmer. “Whatever it is, it originated from inside the pod and it's growing larger with every second that passes. At its present rate of growth, it will consume Lister within one hour, after which it will move on to devour the rest of the ship and its crew.”

“Right, that's it,” Rimmer said decisively. “Seal the doors.”

Lister looked up, horrified. “You're gonna lock me in here?!”

Rimmer's tone now took on the air of a patient school teacher explaining a simple concept to an unruly five year old. “That thing has to be quarantined, Lister,” he said. “We _can't_ let it have access to the rest of the ship. You heard what Holly said. It'll consume the entire ship! Scutters! Get this door shut! Quickly!”

“Rimmer, _NO_!!” Lister tried to scramble to his feet, but the vine quickly tugged him back to the floor. “RIMMER!!”

A gush of noise bore down, signalling the locking of the door. The room was now cut off, quarantined from the rest of the ship – garbage pod, man-eating-plant, Lister and all. “So,” said Rimmer, turning to face Holly's screen. “Holly, how long will it take to do your analysis?”

“Oh, about an hour or so. Give or take.”

“Alright then,” now Rimmer's voice took on that pompous tone he used when he was pretending to be a superior officer as opposed to a superior chicken-soup-machine repair guy. “I shall be returning in an hour to view your progress.” He saluted his silly salute, then turned his back, making for the exit.

Lister was aghast. “You're just gonna leave me in here with this... thing?!” He watched, helpless, as Rimmer walked away from him. “You slimy dog faced weasely little c–”

 


	2. Chapter 2

Marching out of the quarantine room, Rimmer made his way along the corridor, unable to keep the glee from seeping across his face. Of course, Lister probably wouldn't die – Holly would finish the analysis before then - and then they could figure out what to do next. But the lazy bum would suffer in the meantime, and it would most certainly teach him a lesson or two about insubordination. He wouldn't be in danger. They'd get him out long before any dying happened. Well... probably.

But if the ravenous plant _did_ end up consuming Lister, then Lister only had himself to blame for it. He should have followed procedure, like Rimmer always told him. It was his _own_ fault he was in this mess. Anyway, what was the point in worrying about it? It wasn't as if he could do anything until Holly completed the analysis. So Rimmer continued his way along the corridor and back to his quarters, unable to keep the spring out of his step, unable to resist the urge to hum an uplifting military tune to himself.

He hadn't got far when he noticed a shadowy shape at the end of the corridor, and as he drew closer he realised that it was the Cat. He suppressed a small shudder. It still gave him the creeps to think that Lister had once hidden a pet cat in their quarters, and right under Rimmer's nose! Dirty, flea-ridden animals, Rimmer couldn't stand them, and he couldn't understand why everyone else seemed to coo over them so much. Before he died, he used to use the excuse that he was allergic to avoid going near them. He wasn't, but saying so was easier than admitting that he just didn't like them. Now he was a hologram, he had no such excuse. He just had to put up with it.

He stopped humming, let his smile fade, and hoped that he could get by without having to interact with the creature. Perhaps if he was quick and quiet, the Cat wouldn't even notice him, and he could continue on his way unhindered.

Then he saw what the stupid moggie was _doing_.

The Cat was rubbing his face against the wall. Up, down, up, down, the Cat pressed his cheek into the flat corridor wall and nuzzled it several times, before pausing, taking a step forward, and repeating.

Abandoning his attempt to slink past, Rimmer decided that he couldn't resist making a comment. He stood back for a moment and watched as the Cat nuzzled the wall, uncertain whether to be fascinated, disturbed, or gratified to learn that some creatures out there were far stupider than he himself could ever be. Then at last Rimmer broke the silence. “What _are_ you doing?” he enquired.

The Cat jumped back as though stung. “Hey!” he protested. “You see this? This is _mine_.”

“It's a wall, you stupid moggie.”

“Yeah, and it's _mine_! You want one? Go find your own!”

Rimmer breathed in silently through his nostrils. “Why were rubbing your face against it?” he asked.

The Cat straightened and looked very proud of himself. “I'm letting all the lady cats know that I'm a _vail_ able!” he proclaimed, making a sing-song of the last word. “What, don't you monkeys have scent glands?”

The question didn't deserve an answer. Instead, Rimmer, doing a poor job of hiding his disdain, replied with a question of his own. “You _are_ aware that there's no other felines on board?” he asked.

“You expect me to believe that?” said the Cat. “No way! There's just millions of lady cats out there, all waiting for me to show 'em a good time! Maybe even more than millions... maybe thousands!”

“I should take you up to the medilab and get you neutered,” Rimmer remarked.

“Neutered? What're you talking about, Goalpost Head?”

An evil thought came to Rimmer now, and the sly smile worked its way back onto his smug face. “Neutered,” he said. “It's a sort of feline rite of passage. Where I come from, all cats are neutered as soon as they reach adulthood. If you don't have it done too, then all the lady cats will think of you as a... a kitten!”

The Cat looked thoughtful for a moment, and Rimmer could hardly contain his glee. _The animal was actually considering it!_

But then the Cat frowned. “You monkeys sure have a funny way of doing things,” he said. “I do a new turd every single day! Sometimes even two or three times a day. You guys don't take a crap 'til you're grown up? You have to store it up all that time? What happens? Do you get to your eighteenth birthday and then you just explode in a shower of turd? Eugh, yuck! I wouldn't wanna be around to clean up _that_ mess!” and with that the Cat was dancing off down the corridor again, searching for the next bit of wall to rub his face on.

Shaking his head, Rimmer continued on his way.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Lister felt wretched. He lay helpless on the floor of the quarantine room, and a man-eating plant was about to eat him alive. And now Rimmer had locked the door and gone, his escape chances dropped to nil.

The plant's viney tendrils wrapped themselves all around him, pinning his legs together and his arms to his sides. They pressed into his chest, half-suffocating him, and they pressed on his belly, half-crushing his bladder. As if that wasn't bad enough, he kinda felt like he needed to pee, and now his abdomen ached with the effort of holding it in.

He craned his neck up, found one of Holly's screens and focused on it. “Holly!” he pleaded. “Can you do anything?”

“Sorry, Dave,” Holly replied. “Not much I can do from here.”

“But this thing's half crushing me!”

“You want my advice?” Holly said. “Stop fighting it.”

“You what?”

“Every time you try to pull yourself free, it tightens its hold, right?

Lister nodded... or tried to. The vines around his neck made it very difficult to make any movement at all. “So you're saying,” he said with difficulty, “if I stop trying to untangle it then it'll let me go by itself?”

“Well, in theory,” Holly agreed. “Nothing else you've tried so far has worked, so I reckon it's worth a go.”

“Okay.” Lister took a deep breath, and decided to trust Holly on this one. He let his muscles go limp. His arms and legs flopped down motionless. The vines starting to uncoil from around his ankles, and he let out a sigh of relief. _It worked!_

Then, all of a sudden, the plant let out a slurping sound, gathered Lister up, dragged him into the pod and swallowed him whole.

“Then again,” said Holly, “maybe not.”

 


	4. Chapter 4

The huge belching sound shook the whole ship. A long, deep belch, full of belly and gusto, rising gently in pitch and volume before finally ending on an impressive gurgling finale. Soundproof doors and walls stood there, powerless to stop it. In his quarters, Rimmer jumped up, startled. “What was that?” he demanded.

“That,” said Holly, “was the sound of Third Technician David Lister being swallowed by a ravenous man-eating plant.”

Rimmer opened his mouth to ask a question, but Holly continued.

“By consuming Dave Lister,” the computer said, “the plant has accumulated enough strength to break out of the garbage pod in which it was contained, and is presently increasing its mass at a rate of six point six per cent every sixty seconds.”

Rimmer tried, and failed, to make sense of that. “What does it mean?” he asked, trying not to sound stupid.

“Six six six? I guess that could be bad luck, if you're the superstitious type.”

Rimmer narrowed his eyes and tried to look intimidating. “Holly, may I remind you that I am the superior officer on board this ship, and you have to do exactly what I tell you.” He squared his shoulders and lifted his chin. “Stop making stupid remarks and explain what's happening, and without the attitude this time, alright?”

“What I'm saying,” said Holly patiently, “is that every fifteen minutes, the plant thing doubles its size.”

“How long before it consumes the ship?”

“At its present rate of growth, about three hours.”

“Three hours!”

“But it'll be into the vital systems long before then.”

“Is there anything we can do?”

“Yeah. Start working on your bucket list, mate. You said you always wanted to learn Portuguese. Well,” Holly gave him a nod of encouragement, “now's the time to start.”

 


	5. Chapter 5

The Cat was having the time of his life. In less that an hour he'd investigated an entire corridor, claimed all the best parts of it, and rubbed his scent along the walls. Lady cats from far and wide would smell his dangerous masculine perfume, know that he was available, and hurry up and get into heat before the window of opportunity closed. He'd better get something to eat. He'd need to build up his strength for the marathon orgy that awaited him.

A massive belch echoed down the corridor, rattling the fixtures around the doors. Probably the human finishing another curry. Cat ignored it. Not his problem. He had more important things to do. He made his way up to the nearest food dispenser, remembering how Goalpost Head had instructed him on its workings, and pressed the button.

“Fish!”

The sound of the machinery at work told him that his food was on its way. He waited eagerly as the dispenser dropped a food box onto the hatchway, then reached forward to grab it.

But something wasn't right. Something was out of place. The Cat drew back his hand. He felt uneasy. The tiny hairs on the back of his arm were all standing on end. His nostril hairs tingled. The box didn't smell like fish at all... it smelled more like potatoes. Old, mouldy potatoes, several years past their sell-by date...

He wanted to inspect the box, but the ominous quivering in his nostril hairs told him to leave it alone. He flicked it onto the floor, and tried again. He pressed the dispenser's button a second time. “Fish!”

Again the shelf came down, again a food box was produced, again it smelt wrong and again Cat felt an odd, uneasy sensation tingling his skin and making his hairs stand on end. He took a step back, and the urge to defend himself overpowered him. He couldn't help himself. When facing the unknown, basic instincts took over. He hunched his shoulders, made himself look big, and hissed at the offensive boxes, loud as he could. “Hsssssssss!!”

Goalpost Head suddenly came around the corner. Cat jumped. How was it that he could never smell the guy coming? “What's the matter with you?” Goalpost Head asked.

“I'm getting a weird smell from those boxes,” the Cat replied without taking his eyes off the things.

“It's cat food, you stupid creature. It's supposed to smell like that.”

The Cat shook his head. “I'm telling you, bud, something doesn't smell right.”

Goalpost Head ignored the warning and changed the subject. “There's a giant plant and it's eaten Lister alive. I'm going to flush it into space.”

“Oh, yeah? Well maybe you could flush those out too,” Cat nodded to the rejected food boxes. “'Cause my nose is tellin' me there's something weird inside them.”

“I told you,” said Goalpost Head. “It's cat food.”

“Hey,” the Cat bristled, “you think I can't tell what's food and what's not? I smelled a lot of weird smells in my time, but there ain't no smell as weird as–” he stopped abruptly. An unpleasant choking sensation crept up in the back of his throat. He heaved a breath, and tried to continue, but he couldn't seem to get any air in. Sides heaving, the Cat half-collapsed against the wall, eyes bulging and tears dripping down his face in a very non-daring way.

“What's the matter?” asked Goalpost Head, but the Cat was powerless to respond. This really cramped his style. He must look about as handsome and elegant as a fish flopping in the sand. How could he meet all those lady cats looking like this? The thought troubled him, and he began to splutter and choke even harder. Then a wave of nausea overcame him, and he tumbled to the floor.

 


	6. Chapter 6

As the Cat keeled over, Rimmer looked up in alarm. “Holly!” he yelled. “What happened?”

“The plant has got into the ship's oxygen supply, Arnold,” the computer told him. “It's now draining oxygen from Red Dwarf, sucking air out of every room and using it to feed itself. If the Cat doesn't get oxygen into his lungs within the next three minutes, he will die.”

“Is the whole ship affected?”

Holly's voice sounded strained. “Most of it, yeah. Some areas are unaffected, but it's only a matter of time”

“What areas?”

“Well, just one area, actually.”

“What area?”

“The officers' toilets on C-Deck.”

“Right.” Rimmer nodded and called a scutter over. “Get this moggie down to the officers' toilets on C-Deck, and make it quick.” The scutter hurried away, hopefully to get a stretcher. “Can we still flush it out into space?” Rimmer asked.

“'Fraid not, Arn. The plant has advanced beyond the quarantine room and is now making its way through the tubes and corridors of the ship.”

“But I closed the door.”

“It used the pipes to crawl out.”

“The pipes?”

“The ones that carry the plumbing.”

Rimmer heaved a sigh. That was a problem. “Is there anything else we can do?”

“Yeah. Like I told you before. Start working on your bucket list, mate.”

Rimmer managed to contain his irritation. “Anything _useful_? Have you finished your analysis?”

“Oh, that. Not quite.”

“Well, we need to come up with a plan _now_ ,” Rimmer reminded him, trying his best to inject some urgency into his voice. “Is there any hope of saving Lister?”

“Don't know.”

“Is he still alive?”

“Yeah," said Holly. "Looks like it. His life signs are very faint, but they're there.”

“So there _is_ a chance we can save him?”

“A slim one, I suppose.”

Rimmer considered it. His original last-resort plan of flushing the entire plant (and Lister along with it) back into space wouldn't help now, and he was running out of options. On the plus side, he no longer had to sacrifice Lister for the safety of the ship. If you could call that a plus side.

Something stirred at the back of his mind. Some distant memory, something from school. Buried amid the memories of waiting in line for lunch and being having his head shoved down the toilets... _photosynthesis_. Yes, he had learned about that once. Plants made oxygen by sucking water out of the ground. Or... did they? Maybe he had it the wrong way round. He couldn't remember. He'd been too busy trying to copy other people's notes to pay any attention. And what did he care about plants anyway? But now all of a sudden it was important, and he wished he'd listened. He couldn't be certain, but he didn't think plants consumed oxygen. “Why is it draining the oxygen?” he asked.

“Dunno,” said Holly. “My guess is that the plant mutated while it drifted in space. Most plants excrete oxygen, but this one seems to devour everything in its path.”

“Is it safe to go to the quarantine room and have a look at it?”

“No. But neither is anywhere else on the ship. Look out.”

Rimmer looked around. On the floor behind him lay the cartons of food that the Cat had been playing with moments before. They rolled towards him, as if they had minds of their own. Instinctively he took a step back, and watched with horror as the lid of one of the containers opened, and a cluster of vines and leaves came reaching out of it. _Shit!_ he thought. _That dumb moggie was right!_

“The carnivorous plant has now gotten into the food dispensers,” Holly belatedly informed him.

As the vines slithered out of the food cartons and made their way towards him, Rimmer stepped back again, panicked. Then he remembered that he was a hologram, and nothing could touch him. He breathed a sigh of relief. “They can't hurt me,” he proclaimed as the twisting plants advanced.

“I wouldn't be so sure of that, Arn,” Holly warned. As the computer finished speaking, a sudden vine shot out of its container and plunged right into Rimmer. He flickered as it went through him, then he felt a sickening lurching sensation. He looked down, he saw a pixillated mess where his stomach used to be.

“Holly!” he bellowed, aghast. “What just happened?”

“It's feeding off the light energy your hologram produces, Arn.”

“Is there any way to stop it?!” he cried in alarm.

“Yeah.”

“How?!”

“Well I can always switch you off.”

Rimmer dodged to the side as another vine came shooting out at him. “Anything else?”

“Just try and keep out of its way, I s'pose.”

 


	7. Chapter 7

Darkness. It pressed in all around. Darkness, and warmth. Moist, damp warmth. Lister wrinkled his nose. He felt disgusting.

Wet garbage surrounded him on every side. Discarded food and drinks, cigarette stumps, unspeakable things. He fought back the urge to be sick.

The plant still had him in its grip. It must have dragged him inside the garbage pod. He tried to push the rubbish to the side and clamber out, but it held him fast. _What the hell is it?_ he asked himself. _How did this happen?_ He tried to think. The plant came from the pod. The pod must have been floating in space for three million years. Rimmer blamed his make-believe aliens, but Lister didn't buy that for a second. More likely, the contents of the pod had evolved and mutated into a new form of life.

It smelt like potatoes.

He let his mind drift back, trying to remember everything he knew about potatoes. Once, on Earth, he remembered wandering past Tesco's, looking in the big industrial skips they kept at the back of the store. Sometimes you could find good stuff in there. He'd found socks, toothpaste, a microwave... once he even salvaged a hundred-pack of toilet rolls. He'd kept his toilet stocked up for a whole week! But back to the point. Potatoes. Yes, he remembered seeing some potatoes left to rot in the skips. When left to their own devices for too long, they started growing viney sticklike things, and probably would have grown into a whole plant if someone stuck them in some soil.

Those viney sticklike things looked just like the vines that held him now.

So, what would you usually use to deal with a potato? A masher? No, that just mashed it up, it didn't get rid of it. What about boiling it in a pot? If you boiled it for long enough, in theory it would just disintegrate. Or at least, Lister thought so. But he'd need a pot of massive proportions, several hundred times bigger than average, if he was going to cram this potato plant into it... and he didn't think it would go in without a fight, either.

Maybe he was thinking along the wrong lines. He had to stop thinking about the thing as a potato, and think of it in terms of what it could do. It clearly had fight in it, and strength, as well. It seemed to devour anything it found. And it kept growing, twisting and winding. Why did it do it? What did it need?

The soggy contents of the garbage pod pressed down on Lister, making his gut wrench. The smells were more than he could bare. Wet soggy packets of food and half-eaten junk, bearing down on him. Mouldy fruit juice and yoghurt sticking in his hair, dripping up his sleeves...

Wet packets of food...

... _Wet_ packets of food!

“It needs water!” he cried. “It's the only thing it's had to live on all this whole time it's been floating in space! We need to take away its water supply!” Somewhere above him, he heard Holly's reply, but through the sea of soggy dirty cartons and packets, he could make out no words. The plant pressed down on him. Dirty glumps of rubbish pushed up against his face. The smell sunk into his nostrils and made his eyes water. He could stand it no more. He passed out.

 

 


	8. Chapter 8

The Cat awoke to find himself lying on the floor of the toilets. A nasty smell drifted from one of the lavatories that had something stuck in the u-bend. He sat up. His head swum. He rubbed his temples. Then he looked at himself, and all at once his blood ran cold. What he saw made his stomach churn. His mouth fell open in shock. He couldn't believe it. The horror closed down on him. Terror and fury flashed red before his eyes.

“My suit!” he yelled in agony. “My suit! It's creased!” He jumped up, looked around, and saw Goalpost Head watching him. His stomach had turned into a mass of silly-looking squares. “You stupid monkey!” Cat cried. “You creased my suit!”

Goalpost Head just looked annoyed. He didn't understand the severity of the situation. “You'll have worse than that to deal with soon,” he said. “If we don't stop the Killer Potato, you'll be dead.”

“I'd rather be dead, looking like this!” the Cat howled. With no irons in sight, he tried to press the creases out with his hands, but it didn't do much good.

“Look,” said Goalpost Head. “The Killer Potato has Lister and it's consuming the rest of the ship. We have to figure out a way to stop it. We need to think of a plan.”

“Get me a tailor!” the Cat wailed.

“Will you shut up and listen? The thing has Lister, you know, the monkey? We need to find a way to save him and then get rid of the Killer Potato.”

“No, _you_ need to save him and get rid of the Killer Potato. _I_ gotta iron my suit!” The thought of all those lady cats finding him in this state was just too much to bear.

“It's not important," Goalpost Head said. "You can iron it when we're done.” 

His attitude was unbelievable. Couldn't he understand how serious this was? The guy needed to get his priorities straight. “Listen, Goalpost head," the Cat said. "These creases can't wait. And _that's_ a fact.”

Goalpost Head went silent for a moment. Perhaps he was considering the seriousness of the situation. Maybe there was hope for him yet. Then a decisive look came over his face. “The Killer Potato has taken all the irons and ironing boards,” he said.

That brought Cat to attention. He spun round. “ _What_?!”

“It's eating all your suits even as we speak.”

Cat's mouth fell open in horror. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. “ _All_ of them?”

“All of them,” Goalpost Head confirmed. “And if we don't do something, and quickly, you'll have nothing to wear. You'll be stuck to one creased suit for the rest of your life.”

Cat considered this. Clearly things were worse than he'd realised. He took a deep breath and tried to remain calm. “What do we do?” he asked.

“We need to talk to Holly. There's a monitor in the office at the end of the corridor. We need to get over there, now.”

“What if one of those potatoey things touches me? It might crease my suit up even more.”

Goalpost Head gave a solemn nod. “I'm afraid that's a chance we'll have to take.”

Cat thought it over. The idea of potentially creasing his suit further filled him with dread. But how could he just sit by and let a Killer Potato devour all his clothes? Maybe if he sacrificed _this_ suit, he could save the others. He touched his sleeve tenderly. _Sorry, bud. It's for the greater good._

 _“_ Ready?” asked Goalpost Head.

Cat nodded. “Let's do it.”

 


	9. Chapter 9

One of the advantages to being a computer was that you could see everywhere at once. Using sensors and data, you could observe it all, watch events unfold as they happened, and all from the comfort of your own screen. One of the disadvantages of being a computer was that you couldn't really _do_ much about it. On the other hand, no one could do anything to you, either. So you were relatively safe, as long as no Killer Potato plants got into your primary data banks. Holly reflected on this as he watched the Potato swarm through Red Dwarf's plumbing systems and gobble up everything it encountered.

He'd figured out by now that the thing needed water – well, with Dave's help, anyway. But how did that help them? He could drain all the water from Red Dwarf's systems and flush it into space, that would be a doddle. But then Lister and the Cat would die of thirst. Talk about cutting of your nose to spite your face.

His sensors told him that Arnold and the Cat were running down the corridor from the toilets to the office. Vines infested the corridor, turning it into a pseudo potato forest, and the two had to dodge from left to right, leap over some vines and duck under others. Finally they reached the door and went into the office. Holly put himself on the screen in that office. The plants hadn't gotten in here yet. Some crept through the pipes, but they hadn't emerged into the open air yet. “Get past 'em, did you?” He looked at the Cat. “The oxygen in here will only last you ten minutes. You should've stayed in the bogs, mate.”

“Have you completed your analysis?” asked Arnold Rimmer.

“Yeah, I have as a matter of fact. The thing needs water to survive. The only way to get rid of it is to get rid of all the water.”

“I got an idea,” said the Cat. “Why don't we flush all the water out the airlock?”

“You and Lister would die,” Holly said patiently.

“A plan with no drawbacks,” Rimmer said.

“Wait a minute,” said the Cat, “if that thing loves water so much, how come it wasn't in the bathroom?”

Rimmer rounded on the Cat. “Listen, you stupid moggie! Can't you see this is a complex situation? Leave it to those of us who have an IQ of more than 5 to deal with, thank you.”

But the Cat's comment had struck an unexpected chord with Holly. “No, no,” he interjected. “He's right, come to think of it. There's more water in the bathrooms than in almost anywhere else on the ship, so why isn't the Killer Potato going there?”

“Maybe someone did a new turd?” Cat suggested.

Rimmer rolled his eyes.

“Gimme a moment,” said Holly. “I'll go and have a gander.” He flicked his screen off and went to examine the lavatory.

He found the place clean, and to begin with he couldn't see anything unusual. He scanned the surfaces, the sinks and the toilets and the cisterns and the urinals. Everything seemed normal.

He pressed in a little deeper. There had to be something about this place that kept the Killer Potato at bay. He scanned the light fittings – all normal – and the floor tiles – normal again. At last he extended his search to the plumbing.

And there he found it. Blocking up the pipe at the bottom of one of the lavatories, a gigantic piece of human waste. Stuck in the u-bend. He scanned it. It contained Lister's DNA.

The dump was giving off emissions the likes of which Holly had never seen before. They were definitely toxic, strong enough to knock out an elephant. They could certainly fend off a Killer Potato. The plant gave it a wide birth, avoiding the entire toilet just so that it wouldn't have to go anywhere near it. Holly had his answer.

He hurried back to the office to tell Rimmer and the Cat. As he flicked on his screen, he cried out, “I've got it!” then he looked down.

The Cat was lying on the floor, wrapped in potato vines, unconscious, clothing ripped to shreds, and Rimmer's hologram was just a flickering, incoherent, pixellated mass. Some might call it an improvement... but it didn't help matters right now.

He was too late.

Too late...

 


	10. Chapter 10

“ _I need you, Dave!_ ”

Kochanski's voice permeated its way into Lister's skull. He leaned towards it. “I'm here!”

“ _Can you hear me?_ ” she cried. “ _Dave, please wake up. I need your help!_ ”

“I'm here!” he repeated.

“ _It's all down to you now,_ ” she said. “ _Everyone else has been incapacitated. Dave? Can you hear me? Dave! I need you to crap your pants as hard as you can!_ ” She grabbed his face, and he woke with a start. A dream... just a dream. He shuddered. For a moment he didn't know where he was. The last thing he remembered was teasing Rimmer with a dead chicken. Now some viney thing that smelt like rotten potatoes grabbed him by the face.

Then he remembered. He yelled and tried to wrench the thing off him. In the distance, murky and far away, he heard Holly's voice. “Dave? Can you hear me? I need your help. Shout out if you can hear me.” That was what he'd heard. In his dream he imagined Kochanski's voice instead. _Reality sucks._

“ _I HEAR YOU!_ ” Lister bellowed with all his might.

“I've found the key to killing the Killer Potato,” Holly told him. “The Cat's unconscious and Rimmer's program has been corrupted. So it's all down to you.”

Lister struggled up through the sludge and the mess, swimming through the garbage as he tried to force his way up to breath. “What do you want me to do?”

“I need you to let one drop. Do the biggest crap you've ever done in your life.”

Even in the midst of his struggles, that made Lister pause. “Why?!” he asked.

“There's something in your poo that the potato doesn't like. Most likely a result of all the heavy spices you've consumed over the years. If you can do a poo – a really _big_ poo, the biggest poo you've ever done – then that might just be enough to stop it.”

“I can't just take a shit on cue!” Lister protested. “A piss, yeah, I've been needing a piss since I got in here. But I can't do a shit, not now!

“You've got to give it a go!” Holly insisted. "It's you're only hope."

Lister tried. He thrust his abdomen out and pushed the muscles. But he couldn't do it. He just couldn't. It was impossible.

“Need some help?” Holly asked.

“I don't see how I'm supposed to do a shit _on cue_ while a giant potato plant is strangling me to death!”

“You know that Downtown Abbey box set you found? I'll have one of the scutters bring it over and put it on. Don't worry. I'll turn the volume up, so you can hear it.”

That did the trick. Lister let rip, and the smell filled the garbage pod. He passed out again.

 

 


	11. Chapter 11

“Well,” said Rimmer. “Listy's poo saves the day. At last you've done something useful.”

Lister laughed. “Don't knock it, man, it worked.” He threw back another mouthful of beer. The Killer Potato had gone, killed off at its source, and while a few dying brown tendrils still flopped around here and there, most of the ship's corridors and rooms now stood clear. Holly had fixed the oxygen tanks and the plumbing, _and_ Rimmer, and things were slowly getting back to normal.

“Just a good thing you managed to do one in time,” the Cat commented. He was dressed in elaborate funeral gear, and had a sad look on his face as he folded his tattered clothes. “I don't know what I would've done if the thing had eaten the rest of my wardrobe.” He got up, taking the remains of his shredded suit with him. “I'm off to hold a memorial." His voice shook with grief. "I'll see you soon.”

Lister nodded. “Cheers man. Take care.”

“Alright, dudes?” said Holly, buzzing onto the screen.

“Getting there,” said Lister. “I still can't believe it, y'know. A Killer Potato, floating in deep space for millions of years, 'til finally it finds us and tries to eat us. I mean, talk about irony. It's like it got peed off after being eaten by humans for century after century, and decided it was gonna have a go back.”

“My analysis shows that it was descended from an ordinary potato,” said Holly.

“So it wasn't aliens,” Rimmer admitted. He looked surprised.

“No, it's a descendant of the potatoes brought to Red Dwarf from Earth. Over the course of three million years ,it evolved into something much bigger than your ordinary garden potato. The moisture in the garbage pod enabled it to grow, but it wasn't until we opened the pod that it tasted oxygen for the first time. Then it just went wild.”

“And it was brought down by me doing a dump.” Lister didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He settled for a solemn smirk.

“The chemicals in your poo, Dave, resemble nothing else in recorded history,” Holly told him. “I've had the scutters put a sample in the science lab, in case we ever need it again.”

“I wouldn't worry about that, Hol,” Lister said. “There's plenty more where that came from. And speaking of,” he nodded to Rimmer and made for the gents' room. “I'll be back in a mo.”

When he was done, the smell billowed out of the bathroom. He opened the door, and it wafted through to the room. Rimmer smelt it and bolted for the door.

Lister laughed again. “It wasn't that bad, was it? How come _he_ can smell it? Can holograms smell?”

Holly appeared on the screen, wearing a gas mask. “Er...” Holly coughed and choked, “I... I'll answer you... in a moment... Dave.”

Lister stared. “You're a computer, _you_ can't smell.”

“Like I said...” Holly rasped for breath, “the chemicals resemble nothing else in recorded history!” He stuttered and dissolved into a coughing fit, then flicked himself off, leaving Lister alone.

Lister sat down and sniffed the air. He supposed it was pretty bad. But it had saved the day, so he wasn't going to complain. He tilted back his beer, but the odours coming from the toilets wafted into his nostrils and stung his eyes.

On second thoughts, maybe he'd be better off going somewhere else. He grabbed his beer and made his way down to the bar.

 

 

 

 


End file.
